


Vivamus Atque Amamus

by Hydenseek



Category: Persona 4
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Slow Burn, Vanilla
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:09:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25423672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hydenseek/pseuds/Hydenseek
Summary: This thing between them that they dare not name, what will it become?
Relationships: Dojima Ryotaro & Narukami Yu, Dojima Ryotaro/Narukami Yu
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	1. The Spring

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, Thanks for checking out this story.  
> This is my first fanfiction ever, and my first foray into creative writing for many, many years.  
> I'm still very rusty but I thought that you folks here could help me improve, or even get some enjoyment from my first attempt.

It had become a familiar routine.  
The swish and clatter of the door, the grunts of greeting, the uneven thud of feet on the stairs.

Sometimes, Dojima even saw the boy enter and turn around before he fully entered the house.  
Ostensibly to polish windows at the hospital, or tutor a child in English, although Dojima knew that sometimes this wasn’t the case.

He had been young once, not as many years ago as It felt. He recognised that the face of a youth returning from a night of declining verbs, and the face of that same youth returning from a night out with a teen idol, were hardly the same.

Usually that difference would be stark, but this boy had the same steely, stoic eyes as his mother, set in the same blandly handsome face as his father.  
Someone without Dojima’s keen eyes, honed by years of being lied to by perps, might fail to notice the slight change in expression on that youthfully pretty face.

Dojima had noticed the changes.   
The boy’s face had been bland, almost androgynous when he had stepped off the train at Yasoinaba station in the spring.  
Like the seasons of the sleepy town, he had grown from the budding of a plain beauty and bloomed into the most handsome boy in Inaba.

Chisato had called Dojima himself handsome once.   
Every night since the first they spent together by the Samegawa riverbank, she had reached her dexterous fingers up to his face as he embraced her from behind, and settled his stubbly chin into the delicious dip of her clavicle   
There, she would play her fingers across his angular face as she did on the keys of her piano, tapping his high cheekbones and fluttering the tips inside the rough hollows of his cheek, playing out a tune on his cheekbones, lost to the gentle hush of the water as it lapped at their feet. 

She had been playing out those silent melodies by the water’s edge when she whispered to him that she was pregnant with Nanako.   
He had jumped back, as if her body had grown scalding where his bare arms had wrapped themselves around her waist.  
The gentle crinkling of the faint lines around her eyes as he fell backwards onto the wet grass was just one of the many moments his mind had preserved forever.   
He could recall it instantly, even the slow backwards pull of gravity as she’d watched him stumble over his own feet. 

He didn’t need anything to help him remember that night.   
The grass stained shirt he had removed later that night still hung in his wardrobe, an unnecessary memento of the happiest night of his life. 

He had been talking about Chisato more and more recently.  
The boy had sat down one night, shortly after he arrived, and stared at Dojima with those raincloud eyes, something always brewing behind them.  
Nanako had been in her room, so it was just the two of them. 

Up until that point the contact between the two had been minimal.   
Dojima knew his own conversational skills were severely lacking.  
He’d tried to be friendly the first week with him but Nanako had become upset at what clearly came out as an interrogation.   
Since then, Dojima had allowed a respectful distance between him and his ward.   
A distance that the boy suddenly closed when he sat opposite Dojima that night. 

“So…” Dojima had offered, his voice being slightly louder than he’d intended.  
“How are you settling into Inaba?” It was clearly a question between strangers, the fact that he’d been too busy at work to get to know his own Nephew made him grimace slightly as he fished around for a topic.

“I like it here. I’ve been working hard.” Yu had replied. His voice was gentle and breathy. Slightly reedy, and still carrying some of the high tone of childhood, but definitely masculine.  
He had answered Dojima’s next question before it had been asked.

“That’s good” he said, his eyebrows raised and his head nodding slowly before he lowered his stare, eyes darting around the floor as if a topic would spell itself out on the carpet. 

“I’ve made some friends already.” Yu offered again.   
Either this kid was good at reading people, or Dojima’s social skills had eroded more than he thought.   
“Yeah, I’ve seen you hanging around with that Junes kid.” Once again, the tone was unintentionally accusatory.   
Yu either failed to pick up on the tone or chose to ignore it.  
“That’s right.” He said, “Yosuke Hanamura”.   
“I won’t tell you again to be careful while you’re here, but you should know that the Hanamura name isn’t exactly popular in this town. A lot of those shutters you see in the shopping district are courtesy of Junes.”  
Dojima kept his eyes to the floor as he said this, not seeing his own feet, but rather flicking through the dossiers in his mind.   
The twisted corpse of Saki Konishi started to manifest in front of his eyes, limbs bent and face a rictus of terror.

“Did somebody say Junes?”   
The grotesque image dissipated instantly as Nanako walked into the kitchen.  
Her question was directed at both of them, but she fixed her wide, hopeful eyes on her father.  
“My friend works there.” Yu had turned to face her, and her mouth fell open as her jaw dropped in awe.   
“Woooowww…” she drawled “That’s so cool.” She was looking at Yu as though he was an idol she watched on TV while her father was at work.   
“Dad, can we go to Junes?” it was a familiar request, yet it always made Dojima chuckle.   
“Not tonight Nanako” he smiled, “but you can watch TV for a little longer before bedtime.”  
“Okay!” She beamed.   
She hurried over to her usual spot by the table, and Yu followed her, hand casually thrust into his pocket like always.   
Dojima grabbed himself a beer and settled on the couch, unfolding the local newspaper and scanning the columns for any mention of car accidents, hit-and-runs, speeding drivers.   
This was the rhythm of life in the Dojima household.   
Or, it had been until April. 

Now, for no reason he could comfortably settle on, he held the paper a little lower down his face today, all the better to steal an occasional glance at his Nephew.   
Maybe it was because he was not used to having another presence there just above his eyeline. That was the most innocent explanation.   
Perhaps it was because he had failed as of yet to get any kind of read on the boy. That was a satisfactory answer for now.   
There was definitely something special about Yu Narukami.  
Something that went beyond his stoic demeanor, his silent stares, his pretty face, his breathy voice, his…  
And Dojima did not allow himself to continue down that confusing line of enquiry.   
Instead he tipped the bottle to his lips, and drank deeply as his eyes fell upon a page full of golden week promotions in his newspaper.  
“It’s golden week soon. We should go somewhere.” He spoke to the room, silently proud that he had asserted some measure of paternal authority. 

Yu and Nanako both turned to face him, but Dojima kept his eyes on Nanako.   
“Junes! Junes! Junes!” Nanako chimed as she clapped her hands in glee.   
“Really?” Dojima chuckled, “We could go anywhere you know?”  
“I love Junes!” she half-pleaded with him. 

“Okay, okay, what about you?” He turned to the boy, “Got any plans?”  
Yu looked at his uncle for just a little too long before turning to Nanako and saying  
“I’d like to come.”   
“Yay!” sang Nanako as she rocked from side to side in an adorable, swaying dance of triumph.  
She then stood up and kissed both her father and “Big Bro” on the cheek, before running to her bedroom for the night, ostensibly to plan her trip around the aisles until she fell asleep.   
The room was silent in her absence, apart from the faintest giggle from both men. 

“I’ll try to get two nights off next week.” Dojima said to Yu, the promise hanging in the air made him feel obliged to put his disclaimers in now.   
Yu simply nodded, but didn’t turn back to the TV, keeping his eyes upon Dojima.  
Dojima did the same, though not by choice, he simply could not look away.   
The special quality this boy had demanded his attention, and it was only with great effort that Dojima managed to compose himself and speak once more.   
“I know it’s not the golden week trip a boy of your age probably hopes for but…”  
He trailed off, cocking one eyebrow as he realized he had no idea how old his Nephew was.   
“Say, how old is a boy of your age, anyway?” Perhaps it was the beer, but he was proud he had managed to keep this question casual rather than investigative.  
“Sixteen” came the reply with a slight smile.  
For some reason, a reason Dojima didn’t want to name, that made him feel more relaxed.   
“Sixteen” Dojima echoed wistfully, “I still remember your mother telling me you’d been born.” He stopped himself.   
It had been a long time since nostalgia had been a comforting presence, and Dojima knew that if his relationship to his Nephew was to progress, it would not be as his uncool uncle. 

“I’ll be seventeen later this year.” Yu had not spoken to fill the silence, but Dojima was beginning to get a read on this boy, so far, he knew exactly what to say and when to say it. 

It intimidated Dojima.   
These people made the best liars, and the most compelling truth-tellers. 

He pulled on his tie a little as he sat up on the couch.   
“So how has that job of yours been going?”  
He was not entirely happy with how this question had come out.   
It wasn’t a detective interrogating a prisoner, at least, but it did rather sound like a dad trying to be nonchalant.   
He did not know how the boy could do this to him.   
Ryotaro Dojima may not be the most sparkling conversationalist, but people listened to him when he spoke.   
They did it out of fear, or respect a lot of the time, but never had he felt so unsure of his words.  
“Which one?” The reply pushed Dojima even further off the course of controlling the conversation.   
Yet another insight – his Nephew was tough to pin down.   
“I thought you worked at the hospital.” He said, unable to keep the surprise from his voice.  
“I do, but only three nights a week.”  
Yu paused, if only to enjoy the surprise on his uncle’s face.  
“I also work from my room, translating mainly, but also making envelopes or folding cranes.   
I don’t get paid for the cranes but I enjoy it nonetheless, just like the models I make.”  
Dojima was impressed, and Yu knew it.   
“I…didn’t…” Dojima composed himself.   
“Models?”   
This time, it was Yu who was surprised, but only slightly.   
Back at home he was never praised for anything. His parents simply expected the best, and he delivered.  
He had thought Dojima would reward him for his efforts with some sort of ‘well done’ at least.  
“Yes, I helped a man with one in town, and now he gives me them for free, just to pass on his passion for the craft.”  
Dojima didn’t quite know what to say.   
He was disconcerted by the was his Nephew spoke, as if it were rehearsed.   
He’d also never heard Yu speak for so long without becoming silent before.   
At first he’d assumed that he was probably a quiet, nerdy kid.  
But the way Yu carried himself belied a certain amount of self-confidence.  
He certainly had no qualms about talking to his uncle like an adult. 

Come to think of it, his sister, Yu’s mother, spoke in that same way.   
The measured, clipped sentences of academia.   
He should have expected Yu to be some sort of silent savant, but that was only true half the time.  
The other half proved that the kid was possessed of a level of expression beyond most actors. 

It felt like forever before Dojima spoke again, Yu patiently waiting for a reply, straight-backed and unblinking.   
“You mean like model airplanes?” 

Yu stood up in one fluid motion, like a dancer stretching before a performance.   
“I’ll show you, come on.”  
And as his nephew turned, Dojima saw flakes of green paint under his fingernails.  
Yu walked to the staircase, turned around, and beckoned for his uncle to follow. 

Dojima didn’t know how to react to being invited somewhere in his own house.   
He laughed in spite of himself and heaved himself from the couch.   
It was more difficult than it used to be.   
Though he was still in okay shape, his joints had begun to protest whenever he moved in a way they didn’t like.  
He made a mental note to hit the gym and sighed as he followed his nephew upstairs to the spare bedroom. 

Dojima had not been inside since the night before Yu arrived.   
It was next door to his own, and he made a point of not looking inside whenever he caught a glimpse of Yu sitting at the desk, his hand flowing swiftly across neat notebooks as rain beat a tuneless percussion against the windows.   
It was uncannily tidy for a teenage boy’s room.  
The futon was folded away, the table was clear, and there were no empty cups, plates of food, or screwed up tissues anywhere. Not like Dojima’s room had been. 

Yu stood inside the room, just to the left of the door, and extended his arm in an arc, welcoming Dojima to look at the various figures on the shelf. 

There was a fierce looking pumpkin wearing a cape and hat,  
A smiling snowman that looked like it would probably belong better in Nanako’s room, and a dangerously armed mechanical robot, painted the same green colour that sullied the tips of Yu’s fingers.

“You made these?” Dojima said, openly awed.  
“Only this one” Yu indicated the mecha-warrior on the lower shelf.   
“But I was given this one today too.” Yu turned and bent over to retrieve something from one of the drawers to his right.  
For some reason, Dojima averted his eyes to the ceiling.   
When he looked back down Yu was already facing him again, holding a battered looking box with an even more formidable looking red robot posed on the front.   
“I’m impressed kid.” Dojima said as he whistled through his teeth “You’ve got talent.”  
“Thank you.” came the expected reply.  
What Dojima had not expected was the flash of something behind those steely eyes, like a fork of lightning through a storm cloud.  
“I’m…good with my hands.”   
Dojima gulped audibly.   
The kid was sixteen, did he even know what he had just insinuated?   
No, probably not, but that pause was definitely on purpose.

Dojima was struck by the sudden urge to sling his jacket over his shoulder and leave.  
He was halfway through the involuntary movement before he caught himself.   
He wasn’t even wearing his jacket. 

Somewhere, some god smiled down upon him, as he heard his phone chirp in his pocket, and he was thankful beyond measure for the excuse to leave.  
His phone was flipped open and at his ear before he realized the beeping hadn’t stopped. 

Yu pulled his green fingertips out of his pocket grasping a visibly vibrating phone. He held it up and smiled apologetically.  
“Oh, of course, well…um…goodnight, Yu.”  
He said, awkwardly stepping backwards out of the room and closing the door after him. 

He waited until he heard his nephew answer the call:  
“Hey Yosuke.” And let go of the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding in a long sigh.

He trudged downstairs to the bathroom, where he washed his face and brushed his teeth.  
This took him a fair bit longer than usual, as he didn’t want to acknowledge that fact that he had to wait out his sudden erection so that he could piss. 

After washing his hands a little too roughly, he gently opened the door beside the bathroom, and saw Nanako asleep in her bed.   
Night light throwing gently spinning stars onto her ceiling, and a Junes catalogue open on the floor beside her. 

He smiled, as he did every night upon seeing his perfect daughter fast asleep, and told himself he didn’t deserve her as he closed her door once more.  
He had no idea how long he’d waited in the bathroom, so he crept upstairs as quietly as possible in case Yu was asleep.   
A light coming from underneath the door told him that wasn’t the case, and he was just about to speed up his tiptoeing steps when he heard a boy’s voice he did not recognize, heavily modulated by a telephone, but still obviously eager and conspiratorial.  
“So dude, be honest, which one is more your type?”  
Dojima froze.  
He held his breath.  
No response.  
“Come onnn.” The Hanamura boy continued.   
“Dude, I’m not gonna tell anybody, just out with it, Chie, or Yukiko?”  
Dojima realized his ear was almost pressed against the door.   
“…Neither.” Came the response from the other side of the door, and Dojima considered with furrowed brow, just why hearing that response had mattered to him.   
He waited until he heard the conversation pick up on the phone, and slid quietly down the hallway and into his bedroom.

He entered without bothering to turn on the light.   
The yellow streetlight outside was positioned directly in front of his window, and he pinched the bridge of his nose with one hand as he drew the curtains with the other.  
He reached for the lamp by his bed as his other hand tugged off the tie around his neck.   
His knees protested as he sat down on the edge of his bed.  
The promise he’d made to himself downstairs about hitting the gym came back to him faster than he’d have liked, and he braced his hands on his thighs as he stood up with a groan. 

Walking up to the mirrored wardrobe, he turned his chin with his hand and examined his face this way and that.  
High cheekbones drew up the hollows of his cheeks and made him look drawn and a little gaunt.  
Thick eyebrows were speckled silver, and above them was a network of stern lines etched into his skin by countless scowls, grimaces, and even the rare smile.

He felt and looked older than he was.

“Well…” He thought to himself “At least my hairline isn’t receding.”

He dropped his shoulders and rolled his head around until he heard two satisfying clicks.  
Steeling himself with a deep breath, he slowly unbuttoned his shirt, closing his eyes against the horrors he was not yet prepared to face.   
A funeral dirge played across his mind as he slipped off his belt and stepped out of his trousers.  
After two more huge breaths, shuddered slowly out of his nose, he opened his eyes.  
For the first time in many, many years, he truly looked at himself. 

In his youth he had been the fitness type without realizing it, and the room that Yu now occupied had housed a weight machine and rowing apparatus.   
Chisato had always told him she would love him however he looked, but the way her fingers had rested on his hard stomach, the way her nails raked his toned back, the way she gasped whenever he lifted her up with ease, all these things suggested she had enjoyed his previous proclivity for daily exercise.

Dojima could not remember when he had stopped working out.   
The exercise machines in Yu’s room had still been there the day before he arrived.  
The thick layer of dust betrayed his negligence of his own body, the squeaking of the machines giving expression to his own rusty joints.  
Adachi had taken them for himself, making sincere comments wrapped in jokes about how Dojima was “In good shape for someone his age.”  
Mouthy prick.

A diet of instant ramen and snacks bought on investigations had chased away any abs he once had, but he was surprised that his body had managed to hold on to a mostly flat stomach, even with the beer or two he drank most nights.  
“That will have to stop” he said aloud, clicking his tongue inside his mouth, as if to savour the final taste of it.  
His chest had fared the best in the intervening years.  
No longer could he claim to have pecs, but he maintained a ridge down the centre of his chest that suggested musculature. 

Further down, his thighs remained fit and heavily muscled.  
The tennis he’d played in his youth had built them up to a bizarre measure of musculature compared to the rest of him, and though they were no longer “Hulk thighs” as Chisato had called them, they were still impressive enough to allow him to outrun any perp with ease. Sometimes he even gave them a head start.  
All in all, it was not bad.  
He wasn’t unfit; he just wasn’t as fit as he had been.

Still, as he tensed his body, turning this way and that in the half-shadow, the light landed on parts of him that ought not to be there.   
He could press on his belly and feel his tensed abs, but the small amount of fat that now obscured them was suddenly offensive to him.  
Wondering vaguely if the twilight of his thirties was too late to reclaim himself, he chased the excuse from his mind and said aloud:

“Drop and give me twenty.” He looked himself hard in the eye, before he pressed his chest into the floor and began to slowly lift himself up and down.  
The first one was tough, the second painful, by the tenth his arms were trembling.  
He stopped. Chest pressed into the cold floor.   
Looking sideways at himself in the mirror, he eyed himself in disgust and returned to his masochistic penance.

“For…ty…five.” He grunted with great effort as he allowed his arms to give out.  
He lay there for a moment, sweat already beginning to bead on his brow, and in the curve of his back.  
From this position, one cheek pressed against the carpet, he saw movement from the corner of his eye.   
There were shadows moving under his door.   
In less than a second he was on his feet.   
All panting ceased.  
Every exhausted muscle tensed.  
Crossing the room in two strides, he pulled the door open and darted into the hallway.  
No breathing.  
No movement.  
No sound.  
Stillness.

Then…a soft click.  
Dojima’s head twitched to the left, down the hall.  
A light had just gone off in his Nephew’s room. 

Silent as a cat he padded down the hallway.  
Suddenly aware that he was only in his underwear, he remained behind the door as he opened it a tiny crack.  
It was dark, but he could make out Yu’s grey hair on the futon in the corner, the curve of his shoulder rising slowly, in tune with his measured breaths.   
Closing the door, he turned on the landing light and walked down the stairs.  
Nanako hadn’t moved since he last checked on her.   
He felt sure he knew what he’d seen, or almost seen, but nonetheless he checked all doors and windows were locked, and was closing the door to his bedroom two minutes later.

He got into bed, picked up one of the many notebooks he used for work, and scribbled a few words onto a blank page before turning off the lamp.  
“Jacket on. Curtains open. He wasn’t asleep.”


	2. The Summer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the kudos, means a lot!

It had not gone unnoticed by Dojima that Nanako had taken to Yu quickly and completely.   
She too was not immune to the spark he carried with him.  
It seemed to cast its light upon the crowd of people around him.  
Nanako beamed permanently in his presence.  
The growing harem of girls that followed him around town all looked at him with lust when they thought he couldn’t see them, turning away bashfully whenever he deigned to look in their direction. Although a couple of them simply batted their eyelashes at him ever more lasciviously.   
Dojima noted this for the first time when, upon returning home unexpectedly early, he found an unprecedented number of shoes by his door.   
Sat around his table was no less than eight people.

“Daddy!” Nanako got up as soon as she saw her dad, and ran to hug him in welcome.  
“Look, everyone is here!” she smiled as he bent down to kiss her forehead.  
“So I see!” Dojima chuckled, her happiness was infectious, and he’d never seen her happier.  
“Hey Dojima-san!” Yosuke Hanamura waved from in front of the window.   
His was one of the only familiar faces to Dojima, he’d been unsure of the boy since the day he was brought into the station for brandishing fake weapons in public, but Dojima now recognised him as Yu’s best friend. The other one he recognised for certain was Kanji Tatsumi. In his home. Sitting at his table.   
“Uncle.” All heads turned to Yu, the rarity of his voice demanded it.  
“These are my friends, Yosuke,” He indicated the pretty Junes boy who Dojima often saw riding a scooter alongside his nephew.  
“This is Chie Satonaka.” Yu continued, and the cheerful girl beside Nanako waved exuberantly at him. Dojima had sometimes seen her on his way home from work, practicing twirling kicks on invisible assailants by the floodplain.  
“Yukiko Amagi.” The pretty girl beside Chie bowed her head with a smile.  
Dojima was familiar with this girl. Her family was very well respected, and she’d serviced him and Adachi a couple of times on their surreptitious post-shift onsen visits.  
“This is Kanji Tatsumi.” Tatsumi had kept his head bowed, perhaps in shame, as soon as Dojima walked in. He mumbled “Hello Mr Dojima Sir” but did not make eye contact.   
“Tatsumi.” Dojima inclined his head slightly as a sign of welcome, but the withering stare never left his eyes.  
Yu noticed, and said quickly “I don’t believe you’ve met Rise Kujikawa.”  
Dojima’s eyes jerked away from Kanji and fell upon Risette, in his living room.   
His eyes flicked to Nanako as she cupped one hand around her face and mouthed “Daddy, it’s Risette!”  
The stunning girl beamed and waved both hands at him from beside Yu.   
“It’s my pleasure to meet you Dojima-san.” She meant it, but the polished delivery of a star laced her speech.   
Dojima took note of how her hands returned from the wave to Yu, one curling around his arm for support as she bent her head into his shoulder, and the other coming to rest not-so-innocently on his crossed leg. 

Something crossed Yu’s face for less than a second.   
Embarrassment?  
Irritation?  
Discomfort?  
It was gone before Dojima could decide.

“Oh, and this is Teddie.” Yu finished, motioning to the boy on the other side of Nanako.   
The blonde boy was a picture of youthful beauty.  
Cartoonishly large blue eyes, perfectly coiffed hair, small and slender frame.   
Dojima might have considered his somewhat confusing assessment of this boy, if he hadn’t paled in comparison to Yu.  
“Wow, I finally get to meet Nanako-chan’s father. I see beauty runs in the family.”  
The Teddie boy finished with a strange noise, somewhere between a growl and a purr, and Dojima could swear he had batted his eyelashes at him.   
The rest of the group rolled their eyes in unison.

Snapping out of an odd reverie he’d found in the blueness of those eyes, Dojima said “Welcome everyone!” He looked at Yu, and forgot all about the blue-eyed boy, indeed everyone else was chased from his mind.  
“I knew you had a busy social life, but I never imagined…” he gestured to his full house.  
“Well, make yourselves at home. I wasn’t quite prepared but uh, maybe we could get some takeaway?” Dojima offered, very aware that he was caught off guard, but not minding so much.  
Yu was good at doing that.  
Nanako had been so happy recently, and Dojima was sure this group of kids was why.

“Oh, there’s no need Dojima-san.” Yukiko spoke up, followed by Chie “Yeah we were actually going to take Nanako to Junes with us.”   
Yosuke was next “We have a sale on in the produce department, and I’m sure Nanako deserves a treat after what you girls put her through with those omelets.” He made a wretching sound that didn’t look at all forced.  
“Oh shut up Senpai!” Rise whined.   
Dojima was somewhat surprised when Kanji spoke up next.  
“Yeah, we uh, wanted to take her because, you know, she uhh, likes it so much.” He mumbled the end of the sentence but made several commendable attempts at eye contact.   
“Please dad, can I go?” Nanako looked at him, as if he could ever refuse her.   
“Okay, okay.” He laughed, admitting defeat as if she had browbeaten him into submission.

Five minutes later, the cacophony of voices faded out of earshot and Dojima was alone in his kitchen.  
Hanging up his coat, he looked around the conspicuously silent space.  
The drying rack was full of what seemed like every dish and pan he owned, freshly cleaned and left to dry.  
Iridescent bubbles clung to the rim of the sink, and Dojima was lost in a memory of Nanako popping the same pearlescent orbs with her finger while his wife blew them from a dripping stick.   
Turning to face the garden, the shock of not seeing them there replaced the soft smile on his face with the usual tight-lipped grimace.  
He sighed and heaved open the fridge, wondering grimly how he would arrange the wilted leaves his new diet demanded.   
Instead, he found on the shelf, a dish wrapped in clingfilm with a note attached.   
“For you.”  
Yu’s handwriting.   
Beneath the precisely folded film was a deliciously fluffy looking omelet.   
It was as perfectly shaped as the ones sold at Junes, but the note, and the dishes in the sink told him that this was his nephew’s hand.

He’d seen Yu cooking before.  
Whenever he took Nanako to Junes she always put things in the cart that struck Dojima as odd.  
They would never normally buy cream, for instance, or brown sugar.   
He obliged her that night, and later watched from behind his newspaper as Yu approached the fridge.  
He stood very still for a moment, as Yu often did, and then lifted out those very same ingredients Nanako had placed in their trolley the previous night.  
Dojima had turned to raise an eyebrow at his daughter, but she was already smiling at him, one finger pressed to her lips as she giggled silently.  
Between swift scans of the headlines Dojima watched Yu prepare something he couldn’t see with all the finesse of a professional cook.  
When the decadently sweet smell found his nose, he finally lowered the paper and watched his nephew walk towards Nanako, a plate of sensually jiggling crème caramel held before him.   
Dojima’s head followed Yu, as if the luxuriantly saccharine smell had formed vaporous hands to turn and caress his face.  
“Thanks, big bro!” Nanako chimed as she took a spoonful.   
The litany of “mmm”-s that followed made Dojima’s mouth water.   
He raised an eyebrow at his daughter, one that conveyed his understanding of her unusual purchases, and she blushed as she smiled at him.  
He nodded his head slightly as he said, “So that’s the deal, huh?” and rolled his eyes back towards his paper with a small smile at one corner of his mouth.

“He really is a good kid” Dojima said as he slid out of his reverie.   
“A good young man” his mind corrected.  
Yes, that felt better.  
Dojima had just finished the omelet when his phone rang and he was brought back to senses by the beeping tone, lowering the plate from his face where he had been licking it clean.  
“So he can cook too? Perfect.” He said to himself somewhat bitterly.  
It was Adachi.  
“Hey boss, I uh, hope this isn’t a bad time?”  
The timid voice enough to create the image of Adachi in Dojima’s mind.  
Biting his lip as he interrupted his superior’s lunch break, one hand running through his messy hair and the other holding the receiver away from his ear, ready to be shouted at.  
“It’s fine Adachi, I just finished lunch, what is it?”  
“Oh, well uh…” the shuffle of papers down the line.  
Obviously Adachi had not been prepared for his boss’s unprecedented amiability.  
Was it the omelet, or the fact that Yu had cooked for him that was altering Dojima’s mood?  
He considered this as he waited, with unusual patience, for Adachi to find the right file.  
“We have a missing person, sir.” Adachi finally offered.  
“Kinshiro Morooka, a teacher at Yasogami High.”  
The image of Yu’s report card flashed across Dojima’s mind, particularly the teacher’s signature at the bottom.  
Yu Always good the best grades, he should start saving up some money to give him as a bonus when he inevitably aced the next final.  
“I know him. My nephew’s teacher.” Dojima spoke quickly, urging Adachi to get to the details.  
“Oh, really? Huh, small world.”  
“Adachi…”  
“Oh right, yes sir, he was last seen by several students and faculty during the school camping trip. Witnesses say he was terribly hungover. A fellow teacher gave him a ride back to his house and nobody has seen him since.”  
“Who called it in?” Dojima was already writing in his notepad, the scribbled note from last month “Jacket on. Curtains open. He wasn’t asleep.” Was on the page before him, he’d perused it more often than he’d like to admit, the page being dog-eared caused him a tinge of shame.  
“The principal.” Adachi continued.  
“He missed work yesterday which is very unusual apparently. The guy hasn’t taken a day off in over a decade. They sent a teacher to his house and got no response, called in a welfare check. The boys are on their way now.”  
Last year, a missing person would not have been brought to his attention.   
Inaba had become a different town as of late.  
“Give me the address, I’ll meet them there.” 

Dojima pulled back into his driveway just as the sun had set completely.  
He had taken to spending an hour in the police gym after every shift, and every muscle in his body ached as he hoisted himself out of the driver’s seat.  
The Morooka house was not deemed suspicious enough to be a crime scene, the only unusual thing being the unlocked door, but something about it had bugged Dojima, and he’d spent the hours since going over the other missing persons cases to find a link.  
The files had been open on his desk since the Konishi girl went missing, and he could recite most of them by heart, yet they had provided no insight as to the whereabouts of Mr. Morooka.

He made sure to lock his own door as he kicked off his shoes and walked into the living room.   
“Daddy!” Came the familiar cry of joy from Nanako, always so happy these days.  
She ran up to him and squeezed her arms around his hips as tightly as she could.   
“We went to Junes and spent all day outside and…”  
She had gotten in countless more details before he’d managed to say “Hold on, Nanako, you spent the day outside? But it’s been pouring since this afternoon.”  
“The food court.” Yu offered, “They cover it over in the rain.”   
Nanako continued to speak as if she had not been interrupted.  
“And there was the cutest fox there and I was petting it all day and Chie-senpai helped me train and Rise-senpai sang with me and look what Kanji-senpai gave me!”  
She barely stopped for breath as she withdrew something soft and fuzzy from her pocket.  
An immaculately detailed felt platypus.  
“Kanji Tatsumi gave you that?” Dojima asked, one brow raised in suspicion.  
The Kanji Tatsumi that he knew was more likely to skin a platypus than sew one.  
Once again, Yu was the one to clarify “He made it. He’s really talented. I’ve been encouraging him to be more open with his passion and he wanted to show Nanako.”   
“Isn’t it cool, dad?!” Nanako rubbed it lovingly against her cheek as she looked up at him.  
“It certainly is, I suppose.” Dojima said, still taken aback that the punk Tatsumi had a hidden passion for cute, cuddly creatures.   
“Well Nanako, it’s late, I think we should get you to bed.”   
“But Daaad.” Came the response in a whine.  
“I know, but you’ve had a busy day and it’s already past your bedtime. I’m beat so I’ll be going to bed soon too.”  
“Really?” She pouted as she looked to her father, and her big bro in turn.  
Yu snorted softly through his nose and smiled as he nodded.  
“Okay, goodnight big bro.” she blew him a kiss that he pretended to catch and blow back, and that mollified her more than enough to wear down her resistance.   
Five minutes later, Dojima was tucking her into bed, her new platypus tucked in beside her.  
“Daddy?” she yawned.  
“What is it, sweetheart?”  
“When I’m old enough, can I marry big bro?”  
He could not stop the laughter that escaped him in his surprise at the question.  
“It’s not funny!” Nanako pouted as she playfully slapped his hand.  
It felt like a long time since Dojima had heard himself laugh properly.   
“We’ll see when you’re older.” He managed to speak through his stifled chuckles.  
His wide smile was met by a stroppy pout from his daughter, but she melted once he kissed her on the forehead, and her smile mirrored his as her eyes closed, and her dad backed out of the room.

“I’ve never heard you laugh like that.”  
Dojima forgot his nephew was still downstairs as he backed into the kitchen, and started slightly as he whipped around to see Yu still sat at the low table.  
“I’ve never seen you smile like that either.” Yu finished.  
“Yeah well, she said she’s going to marry you when she’s old enough so I’m getting the laughs in before I have to break her heart.”  
“Better you than me” Yu said, and they both smiled at the prospect of explaining to Nanako why loving her big bro in that way was wrong.   
“Hypocrite” Dojima’s mind told him, and the smile vanished from his face.  
Yu was still looking at him, and he let the silence between them linger for a while before speaking.  
“You look good when you smile.” 

Yu watched his uncles’ eyebrows edge closer together as his eyes narrowed, apparently in confusion, or searching for a motive.  
“Oh, uh, thanks.” Dojima stretched a hand up to scratch the back of his neck as he replied.  
The classic flirtatious gesture was cut off as soon as Dojima registered it, and for a moment, his arm swung loosely in the air as he decided what to do with it.  
“…Coffee?” Was all his mind could give him to say.  
“Please” Yu replied.  
“Cream, right?” Dojima recalled. He had been disarmed by his nephew’s preference the first time he’d asked. Chisato had drunk her coffee the same way.   
So why wasn’t Dojima thinking about her now?  
“Yes.” Came Yu’s response.  
Dojima’s mind was racing as he prepared the drinks.   
Why had he complimented Dojima’s smile?  
Had he meant it?  
Had Yu’s voice always been that deep?   
Dojima made rather more of a fuss than usual while preparing the coffees to give himself time to think.   
By the time he carried them over to the table, his nephew had returned to the paperwork he’d been working on since Dojima got home.   
He set Yu’s coffee down beside him and grunted an acknowledgement of Yu’s thank you while he turned and settled into his usual position on the couch.  
Yu was sitting directly in front of him, and instead of pretending to watch the TV or read the newspaper as he usually did, he simply sat and watched his nephew work.  
More accurately, he watched his nephew while he worked. 

When his nephew had arrived at the train station in April, he had been nothing but a boy to Dojima. A perfectly blank slate, with the potential to be many things.  
The young man that sat before him now, had surpassed all of those potentialities.  
Dojima dared himself to look at Yu, really look at him with his detective’s eyes.  
How would he describe Yu to himself?  
Dojima started at the top.   
The grey hair he’d inherited from his mother.  
Not grey as Dojima’s was turning grey, from age and stress, but the lustrous, steely silver hair his mother had been born with.  
He wore it in a trendy fringe that swept to the side just above his eyes. Dojima realized he had no idea what Yu’s eyebrows looked like.   
The eyes were what scared Dojima the most. That stormy, steely gaze looked right inside you, through you, past you.   
He wished Yu would turn his head so that Dojima could convince himself he could look into them without blinking away.   
Yu’s jaw was not square like his uncle’s, but small and pointed, almost feminine.   
Despite that, Yu’s face suggested little of the androgyny it had on his arrival into Inaba.   
He was no longer blandly pretty, he was devastatingly handsome.   
High, wide cheekbones jutted just below his eyes, and his mouth was small, soft, and perfectly shaped.  
His complexion was flawless and Dojima found himself wondering if there was a single blemish on his nephew’s body.  
Speaking of his body, Dojima couldn’t help but notice how his nephew’s frame had changed.  
He remained average height, but his shoulders had become broad enough to frame his small waist and slim hips.  
Even the baggy shirt Yu was wearing now could not help but cling to those shoulders, and fall loosely down his lithe body.  
Dojima found himself staring at the ripples in the fabric as if he could discern what was underneath them from the way they shifted when his nephew moved slightly.  
He was still staring at what he imagined as a smooth, strong torso when he realized the fabric had stopped shifting, and that Yu had stopped moving.  
Dojima’s eyes flicked upward, and there was that steely gaze.  
He jerked his coffee to his mouth reflexively, and suppressed a shock as the boiling coffee singed his tongue.   
The jolt of pain was all he needed to compose himself as he asked “What’s that you’re working on?”  
The paper Yu was writing on had been about level with where Dojima’s eyes were lingering close to his waistband.  
“Has he bought it?” Dojima wondered.  
Thankfully, Yu didn’t allow for much of his usual silence before he responded,  
“It’s one of my jobs, translating.”  
Dojima slowly nodded, blowing on his scalding black coffee.  
“I’m impressed. You’re acing your exams, making tons of great friends, working several jobs, and still finding time to work out and woo your little sister.”  
Yu laughed, a rare, quiet sound.   
Dojima smiled.  
“It’s not going well though, this piece is written for a child, and I don’t know whether to write it like a kid or do it properly.”  
Dojima though for a moment but was interrupted when Yu slammed the book closed with uncharacteristic force.  
“Sorry, I just don’t want to look at this any more tonight. Would it be okay if I sat there?”  
He motioned to the usually empty seat on the other side of the sofa.  
Dojima paused, was this panic he was feeling?   
Nevertheless, he gestured an open palm beside him, and Yu picked up his cup, and sat gracefully opposite Dojima on the sofa.  
Dojima noticed how little noise he made when he moved, and his mind was torn between thoughts of quick muscles, and the memory of a figure moving silently outside his bedroom door.

“Thanks for the omelet earlier by the way.” Dojima said.  
He felt Yu turn to look at him but did not take his eyes off the buxom weather girl cheerily predicting the downpour they were currently experiencing.  
“Did you like it?” Yu asked as he gently blew on the steam issuing from his cup.   
Dojima felt the slight wave of steam brush the side of his face and turned to look at his nephew.  
“It was delicious.” He admitted.  
“No wonder you have all those friends if you cook stuff like that for them.”  
That soft, breathy giggle once again.  
Dojima could not stop the smile.  
“You really do look good when you’re smiling.”  
The smile vanished.  
“Or when you’re scowling like that, I suppose.” Yu spoke into his cup as he sipped the coffee, his eyes looking up at his uncle.  
“Well, I suppose it’s nice to get a compliment sometimes.”   
“Oh please.” Yu twisted his whole body so he was sat cross-legged, facing his uncle and clutching the cup with both hands.   
“I’ve seen the way the housewives around here look at you when you’re on patrol. The one that lives at the end of the street with that poor dog always stops me to ask if you’re eating well.”  
Dojima grunted “Oh her, yeah, love thy neighbor and all that crap.” He said bitterly as he sipped his coffee and resumed watching the TV.  
“I’m just saying, you could have your pick of any of the women around here if you wanted. You…”  
A sip of coffee.  
After a moment, Yu finished the sentence “…You’re a handsome guy.”  
Dojima chanced a look into those eyes. Nope, not yet.  
“Nah, I’m all out of shape.” He pushed his belly out and slapped it to prove his point.  
“That’s not true.” Yu interjected quickly.  
“You’ve obviously been working out, I can tell.”  
Dojima’s eyebrows creased slightly as he drained the rest of his coffee.  
Was this an appropriate conversation to have with your nephew?  
His eyes cast around the room for anything, anything at all to stop him looking to his left, into those stormy eyes.  
They settled on the table in front of him.   
Laid across the top of Yu’s notebook was a beautifully crafted fountain pen that Dojima hadn’t seen before.   
It was obviously old, yet impeccably kept, and likely expensive.  
“Where did you get that?” Dojima gestured to the black pen with its gleaming silver nib.  
“An old friend gave it to me earlier today.” Came the reply.  
“Oh, that was nice. A pen like that must be a special gift…”  
He had forgotten.  
Shit.  
He closed he eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.  
“It was your birthday today.”  
“Correct.”  
“Fuck…I mean! No, I didn’t say that, don’t say that!”  
Yu giggled again as Dojima jumped from his seat, apparently flustered.  
“Yu, I’m sorry, I’m not used to remembering more than one birthday.”  
“It’s okay.” Yu said, simply. “I actually had a great day, all my friends came over and we made omelets and went to Junes with Nanako.”  
Dojima was still pacing out his guilt.  
“Plus,” Yu said, slowly “I get to spend some time with you.”  
“Not much of a present.” Dojima huffed through gritted teeth.  
“I really like spending time with you, we don’t do it often so it’s kinda special.”  
Yu could see his uncle’s expression soften, even though only his eyes were visible above his steepled fingers.  
For a moment Dojima’s expression was completely unreadable.   
Yu rarely experienced this, and felt the silence become a little too heavy before his uncle dropped his arms and said “Wanna beer?”  
Yu didn’t know what to say but began to nod just as Dojima turned and walked to the kitchen.  
He fetched two frosted bottles, opened them with his teeth, winking slightly at Yu’s impressed stare, and handed one to Yu before chinking the glasses together.  
“Happy Birthday, Yu. I don’t know why you’d want to, but you can stay up with me all night if you like.”  
Something had changed in his uncle, something had slid away and with it had gone some of his inhibitions. He hadn’t even sipped from his bottle yet, but Dojima had the sudden merriment of someone half-cut.  
Dojima felt it too. In an instant the guilt, the panic, the fear, all had disappeared when he saw his nephew falter before him.  
Dojima was in charge now, he was comfortable, cool, collected, and in control.  
He held his nephew’s gaze as he tipped the bottle into his mouth, and snorted slightly as Yu did the same, only to gag on the bitter liquid.  
“You’ll get used to it.” He said as he patted his nephew on the arm.

Yu felt the change in the atmosphere as keenly as felt the changes Margaret described when he became closer to his friends.  
In one moment, he had felt something between them shift, grow, change.  
The image of The Hierophant flashed across his mind.   
This was not the usual incremental increase in intimacy.   
Some strange voice inside him told him the bond his uncle had just allowed him to forge between them, would never be broken.  
Yu had his uncle exactly where he wanted him.  
And Dojima had his nephew exactly where he needed him.


End file.
